


the girl and her nightmare

by nymja



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Original Fiction, Romance, Short Story, dreams + nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-30
Updated: 2015-03-30
Packaged: 2018-03-20 07:49:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3642408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nymja/pseuds/nymja
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Who are you?”</p><p>“Yours.”</p><p>"Then what am I?”</p><p>His lips (that are not lips: they are fangs, they are poison,they are venom that she knows has killed her before) curl like smoke in the corners, matching the dead sand around them, “You are phantom limbs I remember but will never again feel. You are empty spaces between my fingers. You are always gone.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	the girl and her nightmare

**Author's Note:**

> i needed to do something non-work related, and this was the result. first time posting an original short story, i hope you like it (it’s pretty weird, tbh) ! feedback always appreciated <3

“This is where I first met you.”

The voice is new, but she doesn’t turn to look at its source. Her eyes are trained forward, where there lays the road.

It is old, black asphalt faded to a broken, craggy grey like the bottom of her grandmother’s ashtray. It is alone, barren aside from the cracks in its skin and the angry, hissing purple flares that tear apart the skies as lightning flashes (there is never any thunder to follow it).

She swallows, and her heart is thudthud _thudding_ against her chest as she looks further down that road. It lengthens and shortens, it moves to her focus so she can see its end:

The road continues, winds up in lazy spirals, ascending to that angry lightning, and she cranes her neck back, looking _up_ until she can see that it just _ends._ Asphalt crumbles away to nothing, the road is suspended in the air and severed. There is a long drop. Or there is more. The horizon is hard to see.

She swallows, tastes heavy air on her tongue and dust coating her throat.

“Where does it go.”

The owner of the voice does not answer her.

She knows she has asked this before. She knows she must try again, “Where does it end?”

When the voice still doesn’t answer her, she turns.

He stands there. And he is different than before. He is made of nothing, his features are changing. His eyes shine like stars dislocated from a constellation. She has seen him so many times, has known him for so many years, but she never remembers his name. Never remembers him once this is over.

He steps forward. Lightning draws behind him. His steps leave small trees. She would gasp, but this place does not need her breath.

“It ends when you leave me,” he concedes.

She frowns, “…and I always leave you.”

“Yes.”

“For the road.”

“Yes. Though it is not always a road.”

“Who are you?”

“Yours.”

She looks at the end of the road, suspended above them. Looks at the stones, the brushes that crumble. The endless expanse of grey, washed desert that frames the sides of the asphalt that is only a shade or two darker than the road itself.

His fingers slide along the plane of her cheek, they weave within her hair. They don’t feel like skin. They don’t feel like anything. She reluctantly tears her eyes from the road to stare at him instead.

“Then what am I?”

His lips (that are not lips: they are fangs, they are poison, they are venom that she knows has killed her before) curl like smoke in the corners, matching the dead sand around them, “You are phantom limbs I remember but will never again feel. You are empty spaces between my fingers. You are always gone.”

She stares into those eyes (that are not eyes: they are stars, they are the collapsed core that has grown cold, they are holes she has sunken into before) and pulls away from him. His touch breaks from her with the long-awaited sound of thunder.

“I need to see it,” she decides, and begins to walk.

He says nothing. He doesn’t move. She feels his eyes, their gravity, in between her shoulder blades but that doesn’t matter. She walks.

The road lengthens and shortens for her. For her, it bends itself in half. For she has walked this path before, and paths appreciate their walkers.

The air doesn’t change. The horizon never grows closer. Thunder does not sound again. She walks.

When she reaches the precipice, she does not falter. Not even after her feet connect with nothing. Not when her body topples from the edge. Not when she falls.

Because she needs to find the end. And the end is not here.

\--

Years ago, a little girl steels her courage, and pulls off her covers. She tilts her body over, until she is nearly falling off of the bed, to see beneath her mattress.

Two pinpoints of white light stare back at her. Teeth that are too bright in the darkness smile. She would smile back, but she doesn’t want to until she Knows. Because she’s heard him before, the monster in her room. She’s heard him whisper in her ear, seen him move her things. She’s watched his fingers curl, one by one by one, around the metal posts on the frame until she has to look away.

“I missed you,” the eyes in the darkness admits.

“I haven’t missed you,” she replies, blood rushing to her head until it feels as though she is about to go limp and topple over.

The fingers that emerge from the dark are slow moving, and they curl one by one by one around the pulse of her wrist, “Will you come with me?” The monster asks.

She will think about it. But for now, she has dozens of questions and only one answer. So instead, she places her fingers between his. He withdraws instantly, and outside her room, thunder from the rainstorm rolls.

She tilts her head, “Are you always under my bed?”

And the monster frowns.

 “….Only when you are under mine.”

\--

She wakes up.

\--

She brushes her teeth with a headache. When she opens the medicine cabinet to grab floss, the mirror on the other side of it warps as it swings itself into a corner. In its angled state, there is a small gap where she is able to see where the mirror catches its own reflection. She tilts her head, toothbrush still in mouth, and looks into the narrow sliver. There, the white square frame of the medicine cabinet’s mirror is reflected again and again and again, compounding until it starts to make a greenish tunnel.

The toothbrush goes slack in her mouth. She looks and is drawn further down. She wants to see the end. She wants to believe, in a second, in something strange.

She follows the framed steps, as they grow greener and greener. She stops when she sees-

Her cellphone vibrates. Telling her it’s time to go to work.

\--

She lives in a place with no tunnels. No roads. Nothing to fall into.

\--

She’s sitting on the metro with her headphones in. An elbow is propped on the window’s narrow sill. Her eyes watch, dizzyingly, as support beam after support beam blurs together in the underground subway line. The seat next to hers is empty.

As the beams blur, they make it possible to see her own reflection. In it, she looks the same. Dark circles under her eyes, mouth pressed in a tight, pale line.

And in the reflection, the seat next to hers has an occupant. His fingers are slowly moving closer to the ones she has resting on the window.

She starts, sitting up abruptly and fighting a shiver making its way from the base of her spine to her neck.

The train stops. She’s reached her destination. And there is nothing more in the window but the stone bricks of the station.

\--

She decides to walk home after work.

\--

It’s raining. Her fingers are curled around her drawing tote, pressing the sides together as close as she can to prevent water from slipping through and staining her canvases. Like an idiot, she’s forgotten her umbrella.

Lighting cracks. The night sky is illuminated in sickly purples and greens. She counts in her head, waiting for thunder.

It doesn’t come.

She watches the toes of her boots as they walk forward, only stopping once she reaches the end of the road. The air is still around her, and she tilts her head as she looks at the curb between the sidewalk and the road.

There’s a puddle, filling the space between her boots and the asphalt road beyond them. She sees her own reflection, in its dark water. She bites her lip. Waiting. Knowing that if she steps into it, she might sink down into its depths until she reaches somewhere else.

“Looks deep,” comes a voice.

She turns, and there’s a man in a suit standing beside her, holding an umbrella above her head. She looks quickly back to the puddle, but now it has both of their reflections. She frowns at the new addition that wasn’t there before.

“Who are you?” She asks, not looking away from the puddle.

She feels his answer on her neck, feels it travel to the shell of her ear. His lips move against her skin for one, short syllable, and thunder rumbles.

“Yours.”

She moves back from the puddle. And there is nothing beside her but an upside-down umbrella, open and moving in slow rotations on the ground.

She looks around, before her fingers hesitantly close around its handle, and she uses it to protect her paintings as she continues her walk home (she jumps over every puddle).

\--

When she unpacks her work, a canvas is damaged.

The still-life of a man is bleeding from rain, trails of dark water colors running down and ruining everything about his face but the eyes.

\--

She never does remember where she put that umbrella.

\--

When she goes to her bed, she hears static in her ears. A low, keening noise that is almost ignorable. When she pulls the covers under her chin, it grows neither louder nor softer. When she closes her eyes, her body feels heavy.

Until it suddenly feels like it’s pitching forward. As if her entire body has somehow tripped in this supine position. As if she’s about to topple over-

\--

“This is where I first met you.”

The voice is new, but she doesn’t turn to look up at its source. Her eyes are blinking, adjusting to the light. She sits up, moving her head from where it was resting on his lap, and stares out in front of her.

Where there lies the lake.

It is beautiful, clear blue water sparkling in the sun like the chimes hanging in her grandmother’s garden. It is surrounded, framed by lush, green trees and bright, happy flowers. Fat, fluffy white clouds are suspended in the sky, though the bottoms of them are growing darker with impending rain.

She swallows, and her heart is thudthud _thudding_ against her chest as she looks further down the lake’s shores. The waves against them crest and trough, and they pull away just enough for her to see if the lake has a bottom.

The water deepens, sinking in dark steps, descending to a calm bed, and she straightens from where she lays, looking _down_ until she can see that it just _ends._ Sand drifts away to nothing, the reeds are suspended in the water and drifting towards the middle of the lake. There is a sinkhole. Or there is more. The bottom is hard to see.

She inhales, the air brisk on her tongue and the sound of birds in her ears.

“Where does it go.”

The owner of the voice does not answer her. She doesn’t feel his fingers threading through her hair.

But she knows she has asked this before. And she knows she must try again, “Where does it end?”

When the voice still doesn’t answer her, she shifts until her back is against his chest.

His legs extend to frame her own, and the hand not in her hair wraps around her waist. He is different than before. He is made of everything, his body is solid. His fingers are warm, like dark stones left out in the sun. She has seen him so many times, has known him for so many years, but she never remembers his name. Never remembers him once this is over.

He leans forward. The sky darkens above them. His kisses against her neck leave small flowers, winding around her skin. She would laugh, but this place does not need her joy.

“It ends when you leave me,” he confesses.

She grins, “…and I always leave you.”

“Yes.”

“For the lake.”

“Yes. Though it is not always a lake.”

She rests further against him, as he continues to kiss her neck, her jaw, her ear, “Who are you?”

He slides a hand from her hair to underneath her chin, angling her face back towards his, “Yours.”

She thinks about the bottom of the lake, resting below them. Listens to the birds, the cattails that whistle. The endless expanse of bright, green forest that frames the shores of the water. Her bare toes curl in the grass.

His breath lands on her cheeks, it flutters strands of her hair. His touch feels real. It feels like a promise of anything. She reluctantly tears her eyes from him to stare at the lake instead.

“…Then what am I?”

He moves quickly in front of her, and his lips (that are not lips: they are curls of smoke, they are purple lightning, they are breaks in a concrete road that leads nowhere) press desperately against hers. After a moment, he pulls away in order to answer her, “You are the pauses between the breaths I cannot catch. You are time I can’t stop. You always choose to leave me.”

She stares into his eyes (that are not eyes: they are shadows, they are hidden things under the bed, they are the fog that stops her from finding her way home) and slowly pulls away from him. His hand slide away from her with reluctance, and when they are no longer touching it starts to rain.

“I want to see where it goes,” she apologizes, and begins to walk.

He says nothing. He doesn’t move. But his eyes water, and when it overflows it turns into rivers that run down the grassy slope after her. She wishes it mattered more. But she walks.

The tide rises and falls for her. For her, it slows itself by half. For she has swam in these waters before, and tides know who drowns in them.

The rain doesn’t stop. The water, when she steps into it, never grows shallower. The rain creates divots on the top of the lake that look like scars. She walks further into the lake.

When she reaches the edge of the sinkhole, feels the mud between her toes, she falters.  And looks to the shore.

Tears still fall from his eyes, “One day you won’t be able to go.”

She smiles, “One day I won’t want to leave.”

She takes a deep breath. And then dives.

Because she needs to find the end. And the end is not here.

\--

Years from now, an old woman lets go of her courage, and pulls off her covers. She tilts her body over, until she is nearly falling off of the bed, to see beneath the hospital’s machines.

Two pinpoints of white light stare back at her. Teeth that are too bright in the darkness smile. She smiles back, because now she Knows. Because now she remembers: the monster under her bed, the man in her dreams. She knows he’s made promises in her ears, that he’s the one who takes her things. She’s watched his fingers curl, one by one by one, around her own until their hands were locked.

“I missed you,” the eyes in the darkness admits.

“I haven’t missed you,” she echoes from so very long ago, breath coming in short to her lungs until it feels as though she is about to go limp and topple over.

The fingers that emerge from the dark are slow moving, and they curl one by one by one in her hand, “This time, will you come with me?” Her monster asks.

She doesn’t need to think about it. She has dozens of answers, with very little questions. Instead, she brings her monster’s hand to her lips, and kisses each knuckle. He refuses to let go when she tries to release her hold. The heart monitors she’s attached to make heavy noises like rolling thunder.

She tilts her head, “So is this where it ends?”

And her monster smiles.

 “Only when you leave me.”

\--

She wakes up.


End file.
